South Africa, Western Capetown, Deceased Estate Files, 1951-1958

 

Familysearch has updated a collection that could be very helpful for all with South African Jewish heritage. That collection, South Africa, Western Cape, Deceased Estate Files, is a collection of death notices. The originals are kept at the offices of the Western Cape Archive in Cape Town, South Africa.

This Historical Records Collection, has almost 500,000 records, which may contain very important family information. This includes the deceased name, the name of the spouse, birth dates, marriage dates and on some occassions, marriage records. The collectis name searchable to quite easy to use. By following the link above, a search box will appear.

The person I am looking for is Barnett Samuel Cohen, who is from the Province of Pretoria, South Africa. I believe he was born in the early 1920's. I enter that information into the search box and get the result for Barnett Samuel Cohen, born in 1921. Additionally, I also get the names of his parents and his wife.

In order to see the original documents, I click on the camera icon, which is on the far right of the results page. The original documents include some additional information. While the information on the results page lists his wife as Natalie Cohen, the original marriage certificate (shown below) lists  her maiden name as Natalie Janse Van Rensburg, born on 18th of May of 1923, in Parow, Cape, South Africa. They were married on 9 December 1948 in Cape Town.

Other documents included in the file also gave more valuable family information, such as th names of their children from his will (shown below). They are a daughter Rene and a son Manuel.

This is wonderful information for anyone to start building s family history. 

South Africa, Transvaal, Probate Records from the Master of the Supreme Court, 1869-1958

For those with ancestry in South Africa,  over 1.5 million images of probate records have been added to the Historical Collections at FamilySearch.org. These records are the South Africa, Transvaal, Probate Records from the Master of The Supreme Court, 1869-1958.
Doing a search of the name Cohen yields 192 records, including that of Maurice Cohen who died at the age of 38 on 3 Mar 1901 in Kuruman, Cape Province, South Africa. Since the records have been transcribed, we are able to gain some very valuable information just from viewing  the index (shown below).

However, it is not until the original image is viewed that the full benefit of these records is shown. The record is the death notice for Maurice. In addition to the information from the index, we now also have the name of his father, Solomon Jacob, mother, Rachael, wife, Louisa,  and children, Samuel, Kate and Mabel. Also, the location of his birth in the index is stated as being Russia, but the original record expands that to being Palanga, Kurland, Russia. This truly has become a record of his entire family.

This collection is a valuable tool for those looking for family in South Africa. As with all FamilySearch records it can be viewed from home at www.familysearch.org.

South Africa, Orange Free State, Estate Files, 1951-2006

This collection, the Estate Files of the Orange Free State, South Africa, 1951-2006 has over 3.8 million images of the estate files held by the Master of The Supreme Court in Bloemfontein, South Africa. This collection which is available free of charge at FamilySearch, is extra nice for researchers , because in most cases the records contain information on multiple generations. The majority of the records are those normally associated with death, such as death notices, inventories and wills. The record are for those who lived in the Orange Free State region.

Whenever a do a general search in a new database, I always use the name Cohen. I do this for 2 reasons, first, it is a name that is almost always a Jewish name and second by seeing the number of hits, I am able to compare it to other searches to see the level of coverage of the database. In this case there were 449 results that cam e back for the surname Cohen. Almost every result included multiple generations. From the results, I clicked on the link for David Cohen, who died on 4 January 1974 in Harrismith (below). 

From this we now have the names of his parents, Nathan and Gita,  and his spouse Bessie Kadey. In addition we are given the names of three children, Cyril Herchel, Edwin Bernard and Phyllis. While this is great information, if we continue further by clicking on the "View the document" tab, we also are able to get the place of birth as well as his place of residence at the time of his death.

This source can be a great way to link together multiple generations of your families. As with all FamilySearch records it is also free to use.

South Africa, Cape Province, Civil Deaths, 1895 - 1972

In South Africa, the birth, marriage and death records are held by the National Archives, on behalf of the Department of Home Affairs. In 1894, the registration of births and deaths was made compulsory and the record keeping itself began in 1895. These registers are available up to the early 1970's. 

Now, the Civil Death records for the Cape Province of South Africa, have started to be added to the Historical Records collection at FamilySearch.  As of 16 May 2014, the collection contains over 2.2 million records, however only about 11,000 have been indexed at this point.

 A simple search of the collection shows the quality of the information provided.  I knew that Leah Cohen died on 2 Jul 1954 in Cape Town. Using that information, I found the entry below that also gives me her age and her last place of residence, the Cape Jewish Aged Home. The information also provides the Family History Library Film number (1,796,463).

 I was further able to click on the link to view original document. By doing so I was able to view the original record of her death. In that document (below) we also find out that Leah Cohen, was born in Russia. We also find that she is a widow and that her maiden surname was Gradner.

This record should be most helpful more many families. As so many of the Jewish community of South Africa were from places such as Russia, Lithuania and England, their impact is very far reaching. As always these records are available free at www.familysearch.org.

South Africa, Natal Province, Civil Marriages, 1845-1955

Over the last year the Knowles Collection - Jews of Africa and The Orient has added many records from South Africa.These records have included burial records, synagogue records, and a few family histories. Now www.familysearch.org has begun to add more records which are a great benefit for researchers with family in South Africa. The records of various provinces have begun to be added. Included in those records are the Civil Marriage records from 1845-1955 for the Province of Natal.

Images of the actual certificates are also included. The certificate below is for the marriage of Barney Cohen and his bride Essie Smolensky, who were married on 6 September 1936 in Durban.

As with most of the Historical Collection databases, a transcription (below) is also available, which gives the basic information from the certificate. In this case we find that the information came from FHL film #1938559.

In addition, a complete list of the South African databases can be seen by visiting the Africa page of the Historical Collections.

The Jews of Mozambique

 On 16 November 1910, the Ship Garth Castle landed at Southampton, England. The ship had departed out of the Port of Delagoa Bay, Mozambique. On board that ship was Minnie Buirski, a Jewish mother traveling with her 8 children, and most likely very pregnant as her ninth child, a daughter named Beryl had arrived in time to be listed as a 2 month old on the 1911 Census of England. According to that census, mom was born in England, the eight children who sailed with her were all born in South Africa and Beryl brought the family full circle as she was also born in England.
The fact that a Jewish mother with such strong ties to South Africa and England would wind up sailing out of Mozambique may seem surprising to some, but

the country of Mozambique and its small Jewish community has been tied to both countries. The congregation in Mozambique actually was founded in 1899 when Joseph Herman Hertz arrived from Johannesburg. He convinced the Jews of Lourenco Marques to organize a community and to begin acquiring land for a synagogue and a cemetery.
The original Jews who settled in Mozambique were a very diverse mix. Equal parts Ashkenazic and Sephardic, they arrived from places such as Vilna, London, and South Africa.
In 1926 The Sephardic Jews  and Ashkenazic Jews came together and built a synagogue that they shared. However, the fact that even combined as one the community was just not large enough to support having their own Rabbi. During the time of World War II, a large number of Jews arrived from Nazi occupied European countries.
Even with these Jews arriving, the community never really grew and by the time of the Mozambique Independence in 1975, most of the Jews had left the country. In the late 1980's a move was started to bring the synagogue back to the Jewish community. Since the recovery of that synagogue, the community has begun to grow. Although still small, the y have begun to reclaim the cemetery and they have reestablished the Jewish traditions to their younger members.

The Mosenthal Family of South Africa, London and Kassel, Germany

Recently I was able to attend the annual meeting of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain. While there I took the time to again visit one of my favorite places, Willesden Cemetery. Walking the grounds of this beautiful place, always causes me to ponder not only my own ancestors but it also helps me remember all of the Jewish people and the legacies they left behind.

This blog has in the past touched ever so slightly on the history of the Jews of South Africa, however that visit to Willesden Cemetery in London has led me to spend more time studying the area and its great people. As I was walking the grounds, I came across a headstone that I don't recall seeing on my earlier visits. That headstone (shown below) is of Otto Mosenthal, son of Adolph and Henrietta Mosenthal who was born in London on 13 December 1857 and died in Kimberley, South Africa on 17 November 1881.

In the area surrounding resting place of Otto, were the graves of his parents. The headstone of Adolph, not only provides us with his dates of birth, 12 Apr 1812, and death, 21 Jul 1882, but also adds his place of birth, Kassel, Germany. All of the information obtained from these stones intrigued me. I wanted to know what caused a man born in Germany to marry, move to South Africa, where a child was born and then return to London, where he died.

In an earlier post I talked about the earliest Jews in South Africa, people such as Benjamin Norden, in whose house was held the first service in Cape Town. In studying the early history of South Africa, you quickly find that the first Jews, such as Norden, began arriving in the early 1830's. Many of these first Jews were the merchants who built the foundation of many future commercial enterprises. One such group, were the Mosenthal brothers, Adolph, Julius and James. James, was the first to arrive in Cape Town, where he went to work for a relative, Mr. Kilian, as a clerk, but within a few years, after the death of a wife, he returned to Kassel. Then in 1841, he returned to South Africa with his brothers. By 1842 the brothers had set up their first business, Mosenthal and Brothers, in Port Elizabeth.

Trading in many cities in the interior of the country, the brothers became traders in wool,hides and ostrich feathers. In the mid 1850's the brothers travelled to Asia, where upon their return they introduced the first 30 Angora goats to South African. This became another very successful buisness for them.

Over time the Mosenthal's business grew and expanded throughout South Africa. They became a major influence in many cities. They were very loyal to their friends and family, often bringing them in from Kassel to work for them. It has been estimated that almost half of all the Jews who arrived in South Africa between the forming of their business and the early 1870's came for one reason, to work for the Mosenthal's, many of these from Kassel.

The impact left behind by the Mosenthal is incredible. In addition to their business, various members of the family served in politics and civil service. They were instramental in establishing many public services, such as libraries. Later in life, Adolph and his wife returned to London, where they also had families. Many members of the family became quite wealthy, son Henry (Harry) died on 12 January 1915 in London. His will probated on 13 March 1915 at the Principal Probate Registry left an estate valued at over 500,000 pounds.

The records of the Mosenthal family are being added to the Knowles Collection and will be available soon, some in the Jews of Great Britain database, and some in the Jews of Africa and the Orient database.

Norden family of London and Cape Town

In the previous post, I discussed briefly some of the history of the Jews of South Africa. In that post I mentioned that in 1841 the first meeting of the Congregation took place in the Norden home. That home belonged to Benjamin Norden, of Cape Town, who arrived with Willson's party of settlers in 1820. While all of this is true, it doesn't tell the whole story of the Norden Family and their impact on the country of South Africa.

Benjamin, was born in London in about 1798, the son of Abraham and Abigail Nordon. he had 4 brothers and 1 sister, all born in London. Joshua Davis (b.1800), Marcus (b.1803), Samuel (b.1805), Harry (b.1806) and Sarah. After arrival, he became very involved in the Jewish community. First the congregation gathered in his home, until 1849, when the synagogue was completed. He was the one responsible for the building of this new synagogue, the first in Cape Town. In 1858, he and his wife Abigail returned to England. The family can be found in the 1861 census (www.findmypast.com).

Benjamin died on the 14th of May 1874 in Ramsgate, Kent, England. He and his wife Abigail are buried in the Jewish Cemetery in Ramsgate. That cemetery, is located on land that Benjamin and his wife presented to the congregation in 1872.

Benjamin's brothers also left there mark on their new homeland. On 25 Apr 1846, Captain Joshua Davis Nordon, died at the head of his troops during the Gaika War. he was buried in Grahamstown, with full military honors.

Marcus, bought land in Grahamstown, and settled there.

Samuel, was killed in 1858, leading a charge of men during the Basuto War.

Harry, bought land and settled in Graaff-Reinet.

Sarah, married John Norton.

This is truly a remarkable family, which has left a rich legacy for their descendants.

The records of this family can be found in both The Jews of the British Isles and The Jews of Africa and the Orient.

Jewish Research in South Africa

The history of the Jews of South Africa is in many ways the same as the Jewish history of the United States. The numbers may not be the same, but the time frame of settlement is quite similar. The first explorers to sail around Cape Horn, Dias and da Gama, were given assistance by Jewish map makers in Portugal. Their journey, in the late 1400's, comes about the same time as Columbus arriving in America.

While some Jews arrived in both countries up until the mid 1600's, the biggest wave of immigrants came to both countries in 19th century. The arrivals of Jews into Cape Town in the 1820's led to the founding of the first congregation there in 1841. That congregation, known as Gardens Shul, held its first service in the Norden home. These early settlers established themselves in many enterprises, including the fishing industry, diamonds, shipbuilding and the raising of Angora sheep for the mohair industry.

The main immigrants in the late 1800's to mid 1900's were from Eastern Europe and the United Kingdom. Saul Issroff, has edited a wonderful set of books on migration from the UK to South Africa from 1906 to 1930. this collection documents those who left the UK and journeyed to South Africa. This book, Jewish Migration to South Africa, Passenger lists from the UK 1906-1930, can be found in the collections of many libraries and would be a great asset to researchers.

The collection of the Family History Library in Salt Lake City, includes this collection, as well as many others beneficial to anyone searching for their own Jewish ancestors in South Africa. Amongst those records are the records of the Jewish Congregation in Cape Town. These records of birth, marriage and death cover the 1851 to 1989 time frame (FHL film#'s1560759-1560775).

In her blog, Tracing the Tribe, Schelly Talalay Dardashti, brings to our attention the first international conference of the International Society for the Study of African Jewry, to be held in London. It is well worth reading her comments as anyone with South African Jewish ancestry would benefit from this.

UK: South African Jews conference, Oct. 30-31

The first international conference of the The International Society for the Study of African Jewry is set for October 30-31, at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.